Arizona silver belt., 1887-08-27
.ouRyILs,q OF THE r4rH LEc1sLArUKr

mors that crookedness existed ln con.
 nection with the minutes of thai
 assembly, the Prescott Courier assid.
 uously published as fact that Jour.
 nals of the Legislature existed and
 would soon be printed. And in ful.
 iIlment of that assertion, few days
 ago, a pamphlet made It's appearance
 in Globe purporting to be those jour-
 nals, and bearing the name of the
 s'C5urier Book and Job office" as the
 publisher.
 A glance at the book shows that the
 material and work therein contained
 are of the poorest quality, but as Mr.
 Marion, the proprietor of the Courier,
 has only recently received in the
 neighborhood of seven thousand dol
 larslssr printing, etc., furnished the
 %erfiAsSy, together with a claim, for
 colnPerssssen for publishing the new
 code, he, no doubt, feels that he has
 lost a heap of money in his business
 relations with the Territorial Treasu- 'ry, and so couldn' afford to employ
 proof reader or to issue even a seml-
 respectable edition of a public docu-
 ment.
 We also notice that the name of the
 author of these journals has been
 omitted from its proper place on the
 title page, and the reader is left in
 doubt as to whether Marion, Parish,
 Bill Foster, Zulick or member of the
 Code Commission should be credited for the industry made necessary in compiling and arranging the memo randa that comprlse the substance of this work, especially as the memory of its author must have been frequently taxed to furnish many of the facts in this interesting history.
 However, that a semblance of au- thenticity might be given this singu- lar production, Mir. Bayard, the Secre- tary of the Territory, prefxes cer- tifcate, and in it apologies for the lack of manuscript minutes" in his possession containing the proceedings of the Council of February 24th, and also states that "this omission has been supplied from the best sources available, and will be found Tn an ap- pendix attached hereto" The term "best sources is exceedingly sugges- tive, but Mr. Secretary fails to state, for the benefit of the public, who the gentlemen are who figure under these two words. His conscience failed him and he could not designate the pencil minutes made by the respective clerks of the House and Council, as "Jeur- nals, but endeavors to smooth the the facts to suit the occasion, and re- fers to those memoranda as "manu- script minutes" The Hon. Secreta- rvs predecessors have invariably cer- tifed the copies, from which this ! printed history has been heretofore : taken, as manuscript Journals" but despite Marion's reiterated statements that journals existed, the Secretary fails to come to the scratch and back up the assertions made so often by the administration organ" by plainly | stating that he had in hls office, on file, authentic journals, (not minutes) of the proceedings of the 14th Legis- . Iature.
 And upon these manuscript min utes' rest the legality of all the laws passed by that Legislature, together q with the lawful existence of the Code. Before the Legislature adjourned these minutes were questioned and : severely criticised by two different . committees of the House, specially ap- pointed to enquire into their condition, and one ot whom said in the report of i their investigation that they "exam- \ med the minutes of the first fifteen i, days of the session, and believe that r they were correct as far as they were t able to ascertain, " and then the report fl winds up with plaln intimation that fl time was too precious to waste in an a attempt to create order out of chaos f. and the minutes were then abandoned il to their fate. q
 Since the close of the session the b validity of the law providing for W license tax upon the sale ofliquors has u been assailed in the courts, on tho c ground that the Act as published in O the Revised Statutes is not the same n in language and effect as passed by the O Legislature, and that the manuscript O minutes are erroneous. The case is n now lodged in the Supreme Court of n the Territory on appeal, and cannot t, be decided until the next session in 6, January, 1888. fl
 The transactions concerning these O ournals have been fully explained by b the press of the Territory, and it needs fl 10 prophet to foretell for them short q, md stormy voyage en route to their Ii